Friday, July 16, 2010

For those of you who like your shore fishing, there's an interesting competition coming up next month. The team members of the National Shore Team are organising a fund raising competition on Youghal beach on Saturday 7th August. Fishing is from 9pm to 1am in the morning. The fishing should be very interesting as plenty of small eyed ray would be expected at this time of year. Bass should also make an appearance, and recent reports suggest that they are still catching codling off the beach. There will be 2 to 3 zones, depending on the number of entries, with optional pairs and optional pools. The match will be pre-entry and will carry penn points (Sea Angler). If you are interested in fishing this you can contact the captain of the Irish shore team, J. P. Molloy, on 087 - 7946518.

Saturday, July 10, 2010

Yes, there's less than 2 months to go to this year's Festival. The Festival is starting on Monday 6th September. Have you got your entry in? If you haven't give Mary a bell on 021 4812167 or download the entry form from http://www.flickr.com/photos/cobhsac/?saved=1.

As you all know this year things are a bit more interesting. We've up the prize fund to €7,500, of which €2,000 is in cash. The breakdown of this cash prize is as follows: First prize €1,000; second prize €400; third prize €200; and best team of four €400. This is on top of all the great prizes of crystal that are there every year. Here's a pic of last year's winner, Frankie Cronin, with his fine cache of prizes:

Frankie came from way down the field on the last day of last year's competition to win it outright. Milo Burke came a close second with Paul Parker coming in third place. The best 'out of state angler' was Sjef van der Brand, from Holland, who came in 5th place and in 7th place was best lady angler, Sandra O' Shea, who is pictured above with a nice codling.

Although, the weather was mixed the fishing was quite good. There was nearly a thousand fish caught over the 4 days, with good hefty congers making up a significant proportion of the catch. Having said that there were also good quality cod, pollack, and ling. Frankie also won the best fish of the week with a 15kg conger. He had this fish on the first day, but would you believe he had one of the exactly the same size on the Friday. Every angler fared out well, though, with each angler in the competition averaging 5 good, quality fish every day. Once more the craic was mighty and as everyone retired to the nominated watering hole from the pier the banter between the various nationalities was mighty!!!

So come on get your skates on and sign up! If your not in, you can't win!

To give you a better idea of how last year went have a look at the links below:

Richie Ryan has got his new business off to a flying start. Just weeks after getting the Country's first licensed salt water fly fishing boat, Richie has been getting in amongst the bass in the Harbour. In the picture, above, Richie is with South African, Daryn McArthur. This was Daryn's first saltwater bass! What's more he caught it on a surface lure. Not an easy task on your first outing after bass, but under Richie's expert tuition he managed four that day. Richie had hoped to bring them fly fishing but it was just too windy. Instead, Richie went to one of his backup marks that gave plenty of shelter. Once in position they had great crack with all fish falling to surface lures. Well done Richie, keep it up and keep those reports coming!

If you fancy a day out with Richie on the 'Seahawk' you can contact him through his website here http://www.corkbass.com/ or give him a buzz on 086 - 1940744.